Come to Order, Pt. 5
March 2, 2025
Pastor Clay Olsen
We have been examining some Biblical principles based upon the understanding that all of life is about ‘Order’. And thus, whenever or wherever there is disorder in the purposes or uses for anything or anyone, then there is also conflict. Now, some things are obvious that they are not going to work. Other things, although they ought to be obvious, due to our natural human reasoning…they are not. And this takes us to back to the most fundamental principle of human life, which, strangely enough, is not obvious to human reasoning. And that is; that the highest purpose of every created human being is to have a personal relationship with our Creator. Everything else in life follows that reality and flows out of the reality of that relationship. And wherever there is an absence of that relationship, or even disorder in that relationship, there is an accompanying discord and a diminishing of the life experience as well.
In fact, because we were created to have a relationship with our Creator God, each part of us has been created to ‘relate to God’! You remember the encounter of Jesus with the religious leaders who came to Him with this: Mark 12:28-31- “Then one of the scribes came, and having heard them reasoning together, perceiving that He had answered them well, asked Him, “Which is the first commandment of all?” Jesus answered him, “The first of all the commandments is: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ This is the first commandment. And the second, like it, is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” NKJV
We examined this in an earlier study, but we need to look at it again in a different light. Let’s start with the part that is often most surprising to many in Jesus’ answer. ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your mind.’ Let’s think a moment about our mind. How wondrous is God’s creation of the human mind. Now here is an image of the human brain. [show pic of brain] There isn’t a picture of the human mind, because the mind is not a physical thing, but a metaphysical reality, like beliefs and ideas and memories and such. You can touch the ‘brain’, but you can’t touch the ‘mind’. One helpful description of the difference between the ‘mind’ and the ‘brain’ is that the brain is a physical organ in the head, composed of neurons, while the mind is a conceptual reality representing our thoughts, feelings, and consciousness, which is considered to be the product of the brain’s activity. Essentially, the brain is the hardware and the mind is the software that runs on it. And this is interesting, as brain research showed that the brain is like a ‘random thought generator’, generating up to 50,000 unique thoughts each day. While you may not be consciously aware of all of these thoughts, your brain is certainly working in overdrive most of the time. No wonder we feel a bit ‘brain tired’ from time to time. And, just another reason the Scriptures call for us to ‘take our thoughts captive to the obedience of Christ.’ Our thoughts tend to run wild, without discipline and direction and order.
But again, the mind is the seat of consciousness and the essence of our being, encompassing our thoughts, feelings, memories, and experiences. The mind encompasses many phenomena, including perception, memory, thought, imagination, motivation, emotion, attention, learning, and consciousness. It also influences a person’s morality, reasoning, and understanding.* Again, how marvelous are God’s works and ways and created wonders…like our ‘mind’.
So think again about our created order. Your mind was designed by God with this in mind – that is, for you and for me to love our God with all our mind! Therefore, since our mind was designed to love God most, to love God first, to love God above all the other things that occupy our minds, that fascinate our thoughts, that capture our interests…it basically means that when this order is not actual and activated, then basically our mind is ‘out of order’! It’s not that our mind is not functioning…it’s simply that there is ‘disorder’ in our mind. And wherever there is disorder in your mind there will be distortion in your thinking. There will be distortion in how you think about God, distortion in how you think about yourself, distortion in how you think about others, distortion in how you think about basically everything in life…all because the basic order for life is for you and for me to first and foremost ‘love God with all of our Mind! Without loving God most with your mind, you will not foremost seek to know the mind of God in your life. And without loving God foremost in our mind and in our life, we inflict ourselves with unnecessary mental and emotional afflictions.
Mark it down: This is a basic order for our life…to love our God with all our mind, which will then lead us to living a life of loving the Mind of our God! For – to love God with your mind is to love the mind of God! It’s only when you love the mind of God that you seek to better know and better understand the mind of God, the character of God, the personality of God, the will of God, and the Word of God.
Yes, it’s wonderful to seek to better understand the things of this world, but it is of utmost importance to foremost seek to understand the God of this world. Listen to what God told us about that: Jer 9:23-24- “Thus says the Lord, “Let not a wise man boast of his wisdom, and let not the mighty man boast of his might, let not a rich man boast of his riches; but let him who boasts boast of this, that he understands and knows Me, that I am the Lord who exercises lovingkindness, justice and righteousness on earth; for I delight in these things,” declares the Lord.” NASU
How fascinating to understand that what God wants most from us is for us to better understand Him. And the better that we do come to understand our God, better understand His lovingkindness, better understand His justice, better understand His righteousness, and better understand that God finds His delight in each and all of these things…well, the better we will then understand how each of these things relate to us, and to others as we live out our lives, here and in the hereafter, with our God. Nothing in this world, from our wisdom to our might to our possessions come close to the value and the blessings of understanding and knowing God more and more.
All right, but in coming back to ‘order’, we understand then that the highest use of our mind, the greatest quest of our mind, the very created order for your mind and my mind is to love the Mind of your Creator and Redeemer. Again, loving God with all of your mind leads to loving the Mind of God will all of your mind. And in order for us to do that God has given these two things to us: His Spirit within us and His Word around us. Notice: 1 Cor 2:13-16- “These things we also speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. But he who is spiritual judges all things, yet he himself is rightly judged by no one. For “who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct Him?” But we have the mind of Christ.” NKJV
What a marvelous revelation this is! In receiving Christ’s Spirit into our lives, we receive the indwelling Holy Spirit as well. And as Jesus said, the Holy Spirit will teach us and lead us into all truth…and God’s Word is truth. It is also the influence of the Holy Spirit in our lives that enables us to better understand God’s will…God’s plans and God’s purposes, as well as better understand His desire to restore people to a personal relationship with Him through saving faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. The indwelling Holy Spirit enables us to see and to evaluate things from God’s perspective, and to adopt God’s values, and to love what God loves and to hate what God hates…sin! The Holy Spirit enables us to better understand God’s holiness and justice and grace and mercy. And He enables us to adopt the attitude in our mind that Jesus had in His mind…Phil 2:5-8 – “Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” NASU
By the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit we can choose each day to adopt the attitude of Jesus and empty ourselves of ruling ourselves and instead, and by our created order…we bow to the rightful rule of our God. We take our rightful place as the Steward of our life, and we give God His rightful place as the Master of our lives…the King of our lives…the Lord of our lives. And with this RMA…this Right Mental Attitude, we then conduct ourselves like Jesus in being humble and obedient to our Heavenly Father.
So, to have the mind of Christ is to have the indwelling mind of Christ’s Spirit, the Holy Spirit within us, Who then, note this: Who then leads us into all truth, of which all truth is, God’s Word, the Holy Scriptures!
How about this…in our hands we are blessed to have the Book of Life, the Bible, the Letters of God to us, the Owner’s Manual for Life, and also…the Mind of Christ! Have you ever thought of your Bible as ‘the Mind of Christ’? The Bible was recorded by over 40 different writers, but the Bible actually has only one Author…God! In it, God has revealed His thoughts to us…His mind…the very mind of God. Thus, to love God with all of your mind is to love God’s Word with all of your mind…to love the Scriptures above every other revelation, above every other information, above every other communication in your life. Yes, certainly, be lovers of learning about all the good things in this remarkable world, but be a lover foremost of God’s infinite Word that He has revealed to the world…especially to us, His children.
Develop a growing love of God’s Word like the Psalmist…like this:
Ps 119:47-48 – “I shall delight in Your commandments, which I love. And I shall lift up my hands to Your commandments, which I love; and I will meditate on Your statutes.”
Ps 119:97- “O how I love Your law! It is my meditation all the day.”
Ps 119:127-128- “Therefore I love Your commandments above gold, yes, above fine gold. Therefore I esteem right all Your precepts concerning everything, I hate every false way.”
Ps 119:165-168- “Those who love Your law have great peace, and nothing causes them to stumble. I hope for Your salvation, O Lord, and do Your commandments. My soul keeps Your testimonies, and I love them exceedingly. I keep Your precepts and Your testimonies, for all my ways are before You.” NASU
And the more we grow to love the Words of God, which reveal the mind of God, the more we will also experience the blessing of having a mind that is both functioning and thriving according to the order in which it was created by its Creator. Remember, even the book of Proverbs counsels us and cautions us about the proper development of our mind. Prov 1:1-3- “These are the proverbs of Solomon, the son of David and king of Israel. They will help you learn to be wise, to accept correction, and to understand wise sayings. They will teach you to develop your mind in the right way.” ERV
In our Life Groups we have been practicing reading the Scriptures by using the PCQ and NCQ principles. The PCQ is the question that asks, “What are the ‘positive consequences’ of obeying or acting upon this counsel or commandments?” And the NCQ is the question that asks, “What are the ‘negative consequences’ of not obeying or not acting upon this counsel or commandments?” I encourage you to add that exercise to your own Bible readings and then discover what all you can discover by asking and answering these questions.
In using this with this passage in Proverbs we find some positive consequences are the blessings of gaining godly wisdom…learning truths that are obscured to others because of worldly wisdom, learning Biblical maxims and principles for life, receiving God’s instructions and developing godly discernment, being able to comprehend more about our world and finding insights about ourselves. We also then grow in the discipline of wise thoughtfulness, knowledge, and discretion. Again, in following the order of loving God’s words with our mind we discover the joys of developing our mind in the right way.
Whereas some negative consequences of neglecting or rejecting acting upon God’s counsel and commandments are…if the great salvation explained in the Gospel of God’s Word is neglected or rejected, the consequences of that are an existence of eternal separation from God in a land called ‘Gehenna’. But even for the converted child of God, a neglect of loving and learning and acting upon God’s truths leads to the opposite of the good…a lack of discernment, which leads to being vulnerable to false teachings and practices that are contrary to the Scriptures. It leads to being unstable not only in your thinking, but also in your emotions…being tossed about by the shifting circumstances of life rather than being grounded on the rock of God’s Word. It will lead to being resistant to teaching and counsel, leaving you more and more open to compromising your beliefs and morals, and more and more calloused toward others and damaged in a hardened heart. Essentially, the rightful development of your mind will not be developed because of this self-inflicted rejection or neglect of loving God with all of your mind, along with God’s revealed words by which you were created to order your life!
So, what is his is highest purpose of the human mind…of your mind and my mind? The highest purpose of our mind is to love the Lord our God with all of our mind. This is the created order for our mind. This is the blessed order for our mind to both function and flourish, for the glory of God and the gain of His children. Praise God!
*(Mind/Brain information from AI and Wikipedia and Neurosurgical.com)